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Religion, Spirituality and Health

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It has been seen that all the religions of the world promote the concept of health. Religion and spirituality are the things that we come across daily and these are the things that teach us that being humans we have families. For taking care of our loved ones, one has to be sound physically and mentally. In the recent year, much work has been done in the area that religion and spirituality are the determinants of good health of a community. Much work has been done in the field of literature for making people aware about the significance of health from religious point of view.

One common similarity among faith, spirituality and religion is the all these are the source of strength for an individual and they all give him a power to face things courageously when any difficulty surrounds him, particularly when it comes to the area of health they perform all these three things perform same function of encouraging one to face situation bravely (Seybold,et,al,2001). One difference among faith, spirituality, and religions is that not all the religions are going to have the same conception about health. Faith would be the source and target of both religion and spirituality.

In all the cultures faith, religion and spirituality help a person in shaping his life by guiding him about his health by giving him religious commands so that one could take care of his soul as well as body. All these three things help us to develop better health habits that would be right in the view of our Creator as well. There are different beliefs about health connected to different religions (Rippentrop,et,al,2005). For example in Islam it is believed that when one gets a health issue God wants the person to come closer to Him. Secondly in Christianity health issues could be treated by praying to God and asking Him for a miraculous healing that is a part of faith, spirituality, and religion. The third example is that one could be healed if he is having a health crisis by showing faith in His Creator. Personally I think, religion has a great role in making me healthy as I used to follow certain commands that have been mentioned in my religion and there are many things from which I keep myself distant as my religion does not allow them, this also makes me healthy. For example, I used to go to the Church and perform the religious obligation that makes me healthy physically and mentally.

References:

Seybold, K. S., & Hill, P. C. (2001). The role of religion and spirituality in mental and physical health. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 10(1), 21-24.

Rippentrop, A. E., Altmaier, E. M., Chen, J. J., Found, E. M., & Keffala, V. J. (2005). The relationship between religion/spirituality and physical health, mental health, and pain in a chronic pain population. Pain, 116(3), 311-321.